Tuesday 16 October 2018

8 basics of High Converting Websites

Nowadays, conversion is perhaps the most crucial aspect of online marketing. Despite the fact that almost everyone already seems to have a preference and another company which they have aligned themselves with, it is critical to convert visitors to your brand. It is always a tight race and competition is tough. Therefore, a good website—one that is eye-catching and piques the interest of a visitor—plays a pivotal role in business success.
Your website is the heart of all your marketing efforts and the core of your online presence. Attracting potential customers is excellent, but you need to have a strategy to convert them into a paying customer once a visitor lands on your website. To increase the chance of conversion, you must understand:
  • your ideal customer
  • their intent
  • their challenges
  • what they expect from your website
Every customer’s journey starts by researching online, and your brand’s website must guide potential customers through their journey. You should design it to tell them an engaging story, to highlight a problem, to provide the solution, to call them to action, and to promise a happy ending.
To design a marketing-activated website that converts visitors into customers, try to keep these 8 best practices of high-converting websites in mind.

  1. Provide fresh and relevant content

Developing a solid content strategy is key to ensuring your website stays relevant and valuable to your audience. To create valuable content, you must first understand what your target audience needs. Consider creating content that answers questions which are already asked by your visitors. Use sincerity, authenticity and emotion to connect and empathize with your audience.  If you want to make your content noticeable, it is crucial that you make sure your posts and pages are SEO-optimized with metadata, smart keyword usage, and other on-page elements.

  1. Showcase your offerings

Even if you don’t do anything else, you should at least, showcase your services and products on your landing page. You have only a couple of seconds to make the first impression, so make it count. Professional photos and a clean copy will help you put your brand’s ideal version forward. Descriptions and pictures of products should be useful, detailed and appropriate. Potential customers will think again about buying a product from you if the photos are fuzzy even though your website design is great. Still, you should be careful about not overloading your website with graphics. Select a few good images and feature them on the homepage.

  1. Design for customers, not for designers

If web designers are left to their own devices, they will craft a website for design’s sake, not necessarily for the customer.  Nevertheless, in the new era of SEO and mobile-friendly sites, those websites can’t deliver what is required in the market. A user-friendly website has an impressive yet simple design. It’s easy to navigate, quick to load, and efficient in guiding the customer towards conversion.

  1. Place visible calls-to-action

If the website is missing a strategically placed call-to-action (CTA), it will still fail to convert visitors into customers even if it has the perfect piece of content balanced with flawless SEO tactics will. Visitors will read your fantastic content, but unless you push them in the right direction, they might go to a different website where your competitor will be pleased to assist them. A well-located CTA will drive visitors to take the next step. It is wise to use only 1 CTA per page to avoid confusion. Don’t forget that the CTA should create a sense of urgency that compels readers to act.

  1. Do not compromise on speed

People are not patient, and slow-loading web pages will most probably result in a higher bounce rate. Pages which take longer than 5 seconds to load, make visitors frustrated, and it gives them a reason to search elsewhere.
If you want your web pages to have better loading speed, you should consider removing any unnecessary content, such as large images or videos which take extra time to load. Compressing images will also reduce loading time. Finally, utilize browser caching for storing cached versions of static resources to speed up your pages significantly.

  1. Aim for user-friendly navigation

Easy navigation can make a tremendous difference in your customer’s journey, and conversion usually depends on whether visitors can find what they are looking for or not. When designing your website’s navigation, place each section where it feels natural and will be most comfortable to see. Try to restrict the number of menu items to 7 or fewer. If your brand logo is in the header (where it should be), link it to your homepage so that visitors can revisit it without difficulty.

  1. Establish trust and credibility

Potential customers are less likely make a purchase or to enter their contact information if they suspect that your website is not that secure. Show your trustworthiness by highlighting reviews, your privacy policy, case studies, security badges and customer testimonials. Make sure visitors can find your contact information easily so that they know how to reach you. All of these measures will help you establish credibility and trust as a reputable brand.

  1. Communicate your value proposition

Use compelling language to demonstrate and to convince readers how your brand will resolve their problems or add value to their lives. What benefits can customers expect to enjoy by signing up for your service making a purchase? What features make your products better than others in the market? You will see an increase in your conversion rates if you can attract your visitors with your value proposition.

Getting visitors to convert to your brand is not an easy or a small achievement, but rest assured, the 8 practices mentioned here will definitely give you some headway towards that goal. But even after you’ve followed all of these practices, review your website regularly to create a list of changes and optimizations. Be innovative in delivering the best experience possible, and never stop iterating. Optimization is an ongoing process, but the rewards are well worth the effort.

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